Yet more death threats against human rights organisations in South-West Colombia

Santiago de Cali, 28th June 2010

At 10.22pm on Sunday June 27th 2010, a new death threat against a number of human rights organisations was sent via text message to human rights defender CRISTINA CASTRO GOMEZ(to the phone number 3177009645). Cristina works with the human rights NGO Committee of Solidarity with Political Prisoners (Fundacion Comite Solidaridad con Presos Politicos- FCSPP). The threat was sent from the same phone number (3157319271) as the previous threat which was received on 14th June by Cristina Castro Gomez and Aida Quilcue ex-leader of the Cauca Regional Indigenous Council (Consejo Regional Indigena del Cauca). The same organisations are threatened in both cases: human rights NGO Nomadesc, FCSPP, Permanent Committee of Human Rights (CPDH), community organisation ECATE, and trade union central CUT Valle.

The text of the message sentences to death the members of the organisations, and is as follows.

“guerrilla sons of whores, you are just about crying with fear, you will never be in peace, the Ministry of Interior’s help is coming to an end and you’re at our mercy, demobilize now or you die, no more truce for you FARC ideologists, there are few hours left nobody will save you, death to cpdh, Nomadesc, ECATE, Comittee of Prisoners. Death to you guerrilla sons of whores...and your families. Sincerely New Generation...new extermination policy..xrt” (sic)

We stress that we at Nomadesc have received 5 similar threats against the lives of our members during the past two months. Two of the messages have been received by human rights defender Cristina Castro, one was made via a phone call to the police headquarters in the city of Tulua (all three also threaten the Committee of Solidarity with Political Prisoners and ECATE). The other two were sent via text message to afro-Colombian leaders in Suarez municipality, and named as military objectives Nomadesc, CUT, Sintraunicol trade union, and several indigenous and Afro-Colombian organisations from the north of Cauca department including the Association of Indigenous Authoritis of Northern Cauca (Asociacion de Cabildos Indigenas del Norte del Cauca- ACIN), Black Communities Process(Proceso de Comunidades Negras- PCN), and the communal council of La Toma mining community.

Cristina Castro is a professor at the Valle university (Universidad del Valle) Tulua campus in the Social Work department, and was previously the coordinator of the Nomadesc investigation team. She is also a meber of the Red de Hermandad, a solidarity network which includes national and international human rights organisations.

Requests:

We demand that all actions necessary to protect the lives of the threatened individuals and organisations are taken, and that a thorough investigation is carried out into the repeated threats

We request that all of you to publicly denounce these threats and demand decisive action from the Colombian state to prevent any attack against the threatened organisations.

We also urge all of you to demand that the Colombian government takes measures to prevent new human rights violations against communities in South-West Colombia.

If you are in Britain, you can direct your correspondence to the Colombian embassy at elondres@cancilleria.gov.co.